BARCELONA: Manchester United forward Alexis Sanchez pleaded guilty to two counts of tax fraud dating from when he played for Spanish team Barcelona and accepted a 16-month suspended jail sentence, his agent Fernando Felicevich said on Wednesday.

In a statement issued by the Barcelona prosecutor, Sanchez was accused of defrauding the Spanish state of a combined €983,000 euros in image rights in 2012 and 2013 by using a shell company in Malta and omitting the earnings from tax returns.

“Despite proving Alexis did not commit any crime, we felt obliged, on the recommendation of our advisers, to accept the unfair pact offered to us to alleviate the emotional, personal and financial stress that comes from dealing with long and tedious court cases…” the statement said. “Seeing the huge ordeals that Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi etc have been put through, we came to the conclusion that it was best to accept this unfair deal so that we can move on and stop being the object of media and political pressure.”

A spokesperson for Spain’s tax agency said it could not comment on individual cases but that it uses the same criteria and measures for each tax payer.

Sanchez, who joined United last month from Arsenal, is the latest in a long line of La Liga players past and present, including Ronaldo, Messi, Marcelo, Pepe and Javier Mascherano to face judicial process for allegedly defrauding the Spanish state.

Sanchez moved to Barcelona from Italian side Udinese in 2011 and joined Arsenal three years later